Week 2: Self Portraiture

Image of the week

Que Me Veux-Te by Claude Cahun, 1928

I came across this while researching for my studio practice project. Quoting from Jolyon Webber from her article on "Five female photographers who defined self portraiture" for HUNGER ;

"With her androgynous looks and confrontational attitude toward the lens, writer, artist, and photographer Claude Cahun (1894-1954) was a truly groundbreaking practitioner in the art of self-portraiture. Creating work that challenged, even by today’s standards, notions of gender and sexuality, she stated, “Under this mask, another mask. I will never be finished removing all these faces”, presaging the work of Cindy Sherman in particular by decades."

Cahun to me is like a chameleon, she can almost literally morph herself entirely into another character which is very impressive. Her androgynous look really helped in her bold transformations.

1839, Robert Cornelius

Robert Cornelius, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front, with arms crossed 1839, October-November

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First selfie taken in history by Robert Cornelius.

1840, Hippolyte Bayard

Hippolyte Bayard, Self-Portrait as a Drowned Man , 1840

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Staged self portrait as a Drowning Man (October 1840) after he failed to get recognition from the French government for his innovations in early photographic processes. This faked photograph is the first known use of a photograph as humorous propaganda.

1978, Francesca Woodman

Francesca Woodman , Self-deceit #1, Rome, 1978

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American artist Francesca Woodman began taking photographs aged 13, and had created hundreds of small, intriguing self-portraits by the time she took her own life, aged 22, in 1981. Often she captured herself as a blur of movement or a partially concealed presence, but here she faces the camera looking vulnerable, while her shadow self is imprinted on the floor. Surreal and ominous, this intimate self-portrait speaks of personal fragility and artistic self-containment.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2013/mar/23/10-best-photographic-self-portraits

1981, Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol: Self-portrait in Drag, 1981. Photograph: The Andy Warhol Foundation

Warhol's pop art depended on photography. He used found photographic images as the basis for many of his silk-screen paintings, but he also took thousands of Polaroids. Some became the source material for his commissioned portraits, but most were filed away in his archive - a kind of intimate visual record of his life. His most famous self-portrait features an exaggerated version of himself in a fright wig, but the series of self-portraits he made of himself in drag in 1981 is both more restrained and more formally accomplished. Here, the persona of celebrity blankness he so carefully cultivated is refined to an almost self-parodic extent: a mask of a mask.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2013/mar/23/10-best-photographic-self-portraits

2017, Cindy Sherman

Cindy Sherman on her social media handle, Instagram

"Cindy Sherman mastered the art of self-reinvention decades before Instagram was even a thing. Using a camera and transformative make up, styling and art direction skills Sherman’s art is to present herself in multiple guises, often warped versions of famous women or archetypal females. Her visionary work has only become more relevant with time as we’ve entered the age of social media and the chance to contrive and manipulate our lifestyles and appearances through digital means."

Source: http://www.hungertv.com/feature/you-may-now-follow-cindy-sherman-on-instagram/

2017, Vivian as Frida Kahlo

Vivian as Frida Kahlo, 2017

How can i end this post without my own version of a self portrait? Call it self obsession or self investigation, i think having at least one self portrait in this lifetime is a must at this age in time where technology is so brilliant and fast. I mean how can you see how much you have grown as a person physically if you don't at least have an image of yourself taken by yourself? It's interesting to see how we perceive ourselves through our lens and how we choose to portray ourselves and also what we want others to see. It may be just for fun or it may be sending a message but the intention is always there and it's a mystery only the photographer knows.